page_title: Malay Archipelago
section_title: Biogeography
hierarchical_section_title: Malay Archipelago / Geography / Biogeography
caption_attribution_description: Dibujo realizado por Pablo Alberto Salguero Quiles modificación en castellano de Image:Wallace's line.jpg
context_page_description: The Malay Archipelago is the archipelago between mainland Indochina and Australia. It has also been called the Malay world, Nusantara, East Indies, Indo-Australian Archipelago, Spices Archipelago and other names over time. The name was taken from the 19th-century European concept of a Malay race, later based on the distribution of Austronesian languages.
  Situated between the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the archipelago of over 25,000 islands and islets is the largest archipelago by area and fourth by number of islands in the world. It includes Brunei, East Malaysia, East Timor, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines. The term is largely synonymous with Maritime Southeast Asia.
context_section_description: Wallace used the term Malay Archipelago as the title of his influential book documenting his studies in the region. He proposed what would come to be known as the "Wallace Line", a boundary that separated the flora and fauna of Asia and Australia. The ice age boundary was formed by the deep water straits between Borneo and Sulawesi; and through the Lombok Strait between Bali and Lombok. This is now considered the western border of the Wallacea transition zone between the zoogeographical regions of Asia and Australia. The zone has a mixture of species of Asian and Australian origin, and its own endemic species.
caption: Wallace Line between Australian and Southeast Asian fauna. The deep water of the Lombok Strait between the islands of Bali and Lombok formed a water barrier even when lower sea levels linked the now-separated islands and landmasses on either side.
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